Thoughts on Updike’s ‘Hub Fans Bid Kid Adieu’ After 60 Long Years

 https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/1960/10/22/hub-fans-bid-kid-adieu

Ted Williams despised Yankee Stadium,
The size and shadows persist.
Built on a glacial wetland,
Underlined by polished schist.

So the outfield was historically sub-irrigated,
Into a slow and swampy sod.
Naturally moist and ever green,
On which Mickey Mantle plod.

Like all the people around John Updike,
at Ted’s final Fenway win.
In the New England eternal autumnal wetland ballpark,
In Boston’s Post-Cambrian ancient Fens.

The chain-smoking Boston babes, the frat boy humor,
The insecure insouciance of the Harvard freshmen.
Knowing all, knowing nothing,
A place we all have been.

But John, the Ted hypotheticals are a little thin:
What if Mickey Mantle was healthy,
and didn’t drink like a fish,
or if DiMaggio was not so wealthy.

The tired timeless statistical comparisons,
with Ty Cobb and Shoeless Joe Jackson.
A different game played at glacial pace,
Another era. Another eon.